


this tightrope's made for walkin'

by irishmizzy



Category: Pitch Perfect (2012)
Genre: Break Up, College, F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 18:35:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/600862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/irishmizzy/pseuds/irishmizzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Beca does this all the time, cuts and runs before things even get a chance to <i>be</i> something. She’s getting sick of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	this tightrope's made for walkin'

**Author's Note:**

  * For [becka](https://archiveofourown.org/users/becka/gifts).



> Title’s from Matt Stopera’s Nancy Sinatra/Janelle Monae mashup.

“Ladies.” Aubrey stands in the middle of the circle, her face solemn in the firelight. “The time has come.”

“Here we go.” Amy makes a jerk-off motion. Beca reaches for the solo cup of champagne nestled in the sand between her legs and drinks to hide her laugh. They’ve been here, at Aubrey’s parent’s beach house in Hilton Head, for two days, celebrating. It’s mostly been an excuse to lay on the beach and drink, relishing in their post-exams, post-Finals-win glow even though Aubrey hasn’t shut up about passing the torch of leadership since before they left campus.

“Beca.” Aubrey makes a motion for her to stand up.

“Five dollars she has a real torch,” Amy whispers. Someone snickers and Aubrey makes a face while Beca dutifully climbs to her feet and stands where Aubrey’s pointing.

There’s no torch, only a candle that she makes Beca hold while Aubrey holds their clasped hands around the pitch pipe and makes Beca say dumb shit about not burying the group in the graveyard of her aca-motions. The hardest part is not rolling her eyes because Jesus, it’s ridiculous. Thank god for champagne.

“Congratulations,” Aubrey says earnestly and then her face goes dark. “Don’t ruin it.”

“I won’t,” Beca promises, surprised by how fiercely she means it. Aubrey smiles and then everyone’s cheering and leaping up to hug them both.

“I’m going to miss you,” Chloe says, her arms tight around Beca’s waist. 

“Me too,” Beca says, leaning into it.

Chloe makes a startled noise and then laughs. “We should’ve given you champagne sooner,” she says, squeezing Beca tighter. Chloe’s hot with sunburn, Beca can feel it radiating through her t-shirt, warm under her palms. She twists her fingers into the hem of Chloe’s shirt and ignores the urge to push it up and feel how hot her skin really is

Someone knocks into them then, sending Chloe’s cup to the ground. It lands with a dull thump. Somebody gasps and Beca knows, instinctively, what’s going to happen next.

“No,” she says, trying to wiggle out of Chloe’s grip while everyone turns to her, already in various stages of excited pointing and pleading faces. “Guys.”

“You _have_ to teach us,” someone says, and someone else adds, “Come on!” and there’s Chloe’s all up in her personal space again with that stupid huge-eyed look, her hands gripping the pouch of Beca’s hoodie when she says, “Please.” She hums a little, _I’ve got my ticket for the long way ‘round_ \--

“Oh my god, _fine_ ,” Beca says, rolling her eyes and twisting away. Chloe lets her go. Everyone cheers and Beca flushes, a part of her still not used to their attention. She finds her cup and knocks back what’s left in it in one go before she sits on the ground. She smooths the sand out in front of her and takes a deep breath.

“Okay. It’s like this.” She starts slow but they catch on quick. It doesn’t sound as good on the sand as it would on a real floor but there’s a moment right after everyone joins in on the second verse where something inside Beca clicks and she feels all warm and hopeful, the ocean and the stars and everything stretching out before her.

It’s gross enough to make her lose the beat. She has to wait for it to come back around again before she can jump back in. But at least by then the mushy feelings are gone.

**

She wakes up to ten texts from Jesse, who’s home already and apparently bored. 

“Make it stop.” Chloe pulls the blanket up to her chin and the cold air hits Beca’s toes. It doesn’t make any sense; she’d been so hot last night.

“Hey!” Beca sits up to fix the blanket and her hangover hits her full-force. The air mattress shifts, sending her stomach rolling. “Oh god,” she says, just as her phone buzzes again. Chloe whimpers.

 _Call you later?_ Beca texts back. 

_K. Don’t forget advil and grease_ Jesse replies almost immediately. And then, half a second later, _;)_

The mattress shifts again when Beca lies back down. Chloe makes a sound like she’s dying. Beca would laugh but she’s too busy trying not to puke.

When she wakes up again, Chloe’s pressed up against her back and Aubrey’s standing in the middle of the room yelling that they have to leave in thirty minutes. Chloe curls closer, her nose brushing the nape of Beca’s neck. Beca’s stomach dips. Clearly her hangover isn’t going away anytime soon.

**

Summer passes in a blur of part-time work and catching up on sleep and fielding a barrage of emails and calls from nearly everyone in the Bellas. Okay, they’re mostly from Chloe (how many times a day can one person say _Aubrey told me to remind you --_? Beca’s sure she’s after some sort of record) but they’re endless. More than once her mom has made a face -- the one with a raised eyebrow and a half-smirk -- and said, “He seems very doting.” Beca doesn’t what kind of face she makes but it makes her mom laugh every time.

**

Beca starts the new crop of Bellas off easy, has them do the Bruno Mars/Nelly mashup from last year at the frat mixer. It does not go well. There are girls doing the choreography backwards, someone is in the completely wrong key, and, worst of all, no one’s listening to each other. It's last fall all over again. 

Chloe patiently listens to Beca freak out over the phone and then says, “You need to make them fear you. Take no prisoners.”

“So like, sneak up on one of them while she’s in the shower and refuse to leave until she’s nailed the choreography?”

“Whatever works,” Chloe sing-songs. Beca rolls her eyes.

“You’re absolutely no help. I’m calling Aubrey.”

Beca hangs up and shrugs at Amy, who’s been writing a list of possible song choices on the whiteboard. Or she was doing that, before Beca called Chloe. Now there’s a giant dick on the board. 

“She says we have to make them afraid of us.”

“To be fair,” Amy says, “that’s what Aubrey did and you _could_ say it worked.”

“You were really afraid of Aubrey?”

“Yes?” Amy manages to make her nod look like a question. Beca raises an eyebrow and Amy nods again, more certain. “Yes.”

Beca sighs and drops her notebook on the floor. “Fine. I guess tomorrow we make them run.”

Amy claps. And then her face falls. “Not us, though, right? We get to hold the stopwatches and yell?”

**

The running-and-intimidating thing works, which is annoying. A part of Beca wanted to do things entirely differently from the way Aubrey had and okay, yeah, maybe rub it in her face when things worked better. Oh well. 

**

Beca’s well aware that she talks to Chloe more now than last year, even though now Chloe’s got a job and an apartment and shit while Beca’s still in her dorm, layering tracks and trying to pass “The History of Modern France” while not running the Bellas into the ground. At first it was weird and kind of overwhelming, being in that kind of constant contact with somebody -- “In Tasmania we call that friendship,” Amy had said. “Do you not have that in America?” 

“Fuck off,” Beca’d said, laughing. After that she’d stopped complaining about how much Chloe texts her. -- but at some point she stopped resisting and must've like, grown as a person, because it barely phases her anymore, not even when Chloe’s face pops up on Skype, waving to Beca and Jesse and immediately launching into a million questions about Regionals. 

“Did you submit your competition applications yet?” she asks. “Because I don’t know if I --”

“Wait,” Beca says, ignoring Jesse’s sigh when she crawls over legs so she can sit at her desk, “as reigning champions we’re not just grandfathered in?”

Chloe’s mouth falls open and her eyes go wide and it looks like the stream is cutting out because she honest-to-god sputters. Beca can’t hold her laughter back for long.

“You told me,” Beca says, “Remember? Two weeks ago, when you Skyped me and then made me fill out the forms and submit them while you watched?”

Chloe shakes her head. Her cheeks are bright pink. “Oh, right. Duh. Sorry, I don’t know why I’m freaking out. I shouldn’t even be worrying about these things anymore, right? Anyway, how are you?”

“I’m good,” Beca says. “Clearly less stressed than _you_ are, control freak.”

Chloe sticks her tongue out. “Shut up. It’s just, you know. Work.” She sighs and waves her hands like that explains it.

“Yeah,” Beca says. She’s not sure why she’s smiling. “Sure.”

Chloe smiles back, quiet for a minute before she says, “Oh! I know -- did Aubrey send you her pre-season checklist?”

“Probably.” Beca shrugs. She has an Aubrey filter that diverts all that stuff from her inbox into its own folder that she only tackles on days when she’s feeling particularly determined. Usually she waits until she comes home at three am on a Saturday, more rum in her system than coke, and then runs through them like gangbusters. More than once she’s woken up to loose sheets of paper with random words scrawled across them, VIBRATO and ACHIEVEMENT, like really pathetic motivational posters.

“She was a really good captain,” Chloe says in that tone of voice that’s weirdly disapproving. She’s great at making Beca feel guilty for the stupidest stuff. “It’s fine. She cc’ed me, so number one: precision.”

Jesse kisses the top of Beca's head and she pats his hand where it rests on her shoulder while she makes a face at the screen because, “Precision? That’s what she thought was most important? Well, I mean, obviously, it’s just -- “

“The judges will take off --”

“I know, the tiniest mistakes. It’s not like I’m some sad freshman you found on a street corner last week,” Beca says. “I was there last year, too.”

“And this list isn’t something Aubrey made up one afternoon because she took too much Ritalin. This checklist has been handed down from generation to generation of Bellas. And it _works_.”

She glares and Beca glares back, caught in a dumb staring contest until Beca sighs and says, “Fine, I’m sorry, share with me your wisdom.”

Chloe smiles, victorious. “Two: enthusiasm.”

“Does this turn into an anagram?”

“Maybe.” 

“Jesus,” Beca mutters. “Okay, please, go on.”

Chloe clears her throat and then pauses and looks behind Beca.

“Where's Jesse?” 

“He's --” Beca turns -- oh. I guess he left.” She hadn't realized. Oops. She makes a face and Chloe makes one back and then launches back into her list. 

“Three -- you should be writing this down.”

“Oh, right, of course,” Beca says, and makes a big show of pulling a notebook and pen across her desk while Chloe watches, biting her lip like she’s trying not to laugh.

**

It’s a little bit luck, a little bit Aubrey’s anagram checklist, and a lot of preparation that gets them through their first non-frat performance. At least, that’s what Beca thinks. Everyone else seems too excited about not sucking to give a crap about how it happened, even if it was just some pre-holiday dog-and-pony show at an old folks’ home.

She fights her way out of the group hug only to end up face-to-face with Chloe. It throws her off-balance -- she had no idea she’d be here, and it’s not that it’s not a pleasant surprise, it’s just a legitimate surprise. Suddenly she’s hot and her heart’s pounding. It’s like she’s retroactively nervous about their performance or something. But Chloe’s standing there grinning, bouncing on the balls of her feet, and Beca recovers enough to roll her eyes. 

“Are you here to stage a coup?” she asks. “Because that works better when there aren’t witnesses.” She staggers back with the force of Chloe’s bear hug.

“I knew you could do it!” Chloe squeezes Beca before she lets go. “Oh, and these are for you.” She thrusts a bouquet of flowers into Beca’s arms.

“What --”

“What?” Chloe’s tone is weirdly challenging. She has a look on her face that Beca doesn’t feel like arguing with. 

“Nothing, I -- thanks.” She smiles and Chloe smiles back, warm and genuine. Beca's stomach does another flip.

“Oh, there you are!” Jesse jogs over and high fives Beca. “Good stuff.”

He hugs her and, over his shoulder, she catches Chloe’s eye. It’s weird, the way Chloe’s face changes right before she spins on her heel. 

“Bellas, that was aca-mazing!” she says, sliding up to the rest of the group. Beca blinks and turns her focus back to Jesse.

It’s only later, when they’re back in her room, that he says, “I didn’t think you were a flowers kind of girl, otherwise I would’ve --”

“Oh my god, are you serious right now?” Beca knocks her knee against his. “I’m not, jeez. Shut up and watch the movie.”

He won’t stop looking at the flowers though, even though they’re just sitting on her desk in a cup she stole from the dining hall. And he’s right, she’s not a flowers kind of girl or whatever that means. They’re still nice, even if they keep reminding her of the way Chloe had been looking at her, eyes dark in a way Beca wasn’t used to.

She makes herself focus on _Groundhog Day_. Beca falls asleep before it ends. If she dreams about floating in the ocean with Chloe, nothing but silence and starry skies and the smell of a bonfire in the distance, well. It’s not the first time. 

**

After that it’s like someone flips a switch. Life goes from busy to flat-out crazed. Between exams and Regionals prep and her shift at the radio station, Beca barely has time to see her bed, let alone anyone who isn’t a Bella.

It’s manageable though. She focuses on the light at the end of the tunnel (“Maybe that’s death and you should go away from it,” Amy suggested before rehearsal one day.

“If you die, do I get to be captain?” Stacie asked. It took Beca ten minutes to get everyone under control. There really are times she wishes she had a whistle, but even Aubrey hadn’t resorted to that) and powers through it. 

She’s sitting on the floor going over notes for her history final, Chloe on speakerphone, humming to herself, when Jesse lets himself in one afternoon. She hasn’t seen him in forever, it feels like. She smiles and waves, setting her textbook down, but his face stays weirdly blank. He looks tired, the kind that goes bone-deep. Beca knows the feeling.

“Let me call you back,” she says, reaching for her phone.

Chloe says, “Yeah, okay,” and hangs up. 

“Did I leave my calc book here?” Jesse asks, looking around her room. Beca shrugs and fixes the pile of note cards he stepped on. “Was that Chloe?” 

“Yeah, she took this class last year so she sent me her old study guides.” 

He scrubs the back of his neck, calc book hanging from his other hand. Huh. She wonders how long that’s been here. “Test tomorrow?” he asks. 

Beca nods. “And calc --” 

“Thursday.” 

I’m sure you’ll ace it.” 

He laughs ruefully. Her room feels the wrong size all of a sudden, like it’s too big but there’s not enough air, or something. 

“I’ll let you go,” he says eventually. 

“Okay.” He’s halfway out the door when she says, “Hey, good luck.” 

Jesse smiles faintly. “You too.” 

The door shuts and Beca feels weird, like maybe she should’ve asked him to stay or something. She opens the door to call after him but he’s already gone and then she feels stupid. What were they going to do, study in silence? Whatever. 

She takes a deep breath and calls Chloe back.

**

It only occurs to her much, much later that she hadn't been talking to Chloe while they were on the phone, that they'd basically been studying in comfortable silence. But by then it's really too late to do anything about it, about Jesse. She feels kind of shitty for it, but there are some things that are easier to do with your friends than with your boyfriend, right? Right.

**

“Yeah, well, you _never_ have any time,” Jesse says, standing there with his arms spread wide. Beca’s not entirely sure how they got to this point but a part of her isn’t surprised.

“I’ve been really busy!”

Jesse scoffs. Under his breath he mutters something about Chloe. Beca makes a face. 

“Chloe? What does she have to do with any of this?”

Jesse rolls his eyes. “Nothing.”

It’s Beca’s turn to scoff. “Oh, okay, sure.”

“I’m just saying, you manage to talk to _her_ six times a day.”

“So what? I see you every day!”

“When was the last time we actually spent any time together -- not at the radio station or when we watch a movie and you fall asleep, but like real time?”

Beca inhales. He’s right and they both know it. But still. “With the Bellas and finals --”

“Beca.” Jesse just sounds tired now. There’s a long pause and they just stand there, staring at each other, and Beca knows exactly what’s coming. She’s kind of expected it for awhile now. That doesn’t make it suck any less. 

“This isn’t working out,” she says.

He sighs. “I know.” 

It’s another minute and then she says, “So that’s --”

Jesse nods and she’s glad she doesn’t have to finish the sentence. He leaves pretty quickly, barely looks at her as he walks out.

“So that’s that,” Beca says to no one, and looks at her computer, trying to remember what she’d been doing before.

**

Beca tells herself she’s only crying because she’s really stressed about Regionals and can’t figure out this stupid piece of choreography, but then Amy shows up in the rehearsal studio, takes in the scene, says, "Oh god, code red," and pats Beca on the arm comfortingly while texting probably a hundred people with her free hand. 

Beca doesn’t really remember the walk back to her room. It’s probably for the best because it might be one of the most mortifying things to happen in her entire life.

“I’m sorry, I’m just really stressed,” she says as Amy opens the door to her room. At least she’s not crying anymore. Amy just rubs her back. 

“I will be right back,” Amy says when Chloe walks in. 

Beca had stopped crying but as soon as Chloe hugs her she starts again. “This is so _stupid_ ,” she says and she can feel Chloe chuckle. 

“It’s really not.” Chloe strokes Beca’s hair and doesn’t say anything else and then Amy's back, five Bellas and two bottles of rum in tow. All Beca knows is she stops crying right around the time Stacie starts krumping to Kelly Clarkson. 

She wakes up feeling like death, trapped between Chloe and the wall. It reminds her of Aubrey’s beach house. And then everything else hits her like a sack of bricks. 

“Fuck.”

The bed dips and then Chloe’s hands wrap around her wrists and she tugs Beca’s hands away from her face. She looks up to see Chloe kneeling over her, all smiles and bright eyes.

“How are you happy right now?” 

Chloe snorts. “Some of us had considerably less to drink. Come on, ups-a-daisy.” She pulls on Beca’s hands until they’re both sitting up. Beca has to close her eyes for a minute after but when she opens them again, Chloe’s holding out pills and water. Beca takes them gratefully.

Eventually Chloe leans in close, her forehead against Beca’s temple when she says, “I think you’re gonna be okay.” She kisses her cheek. Beca’s mouth goes dry and her entire body goes hot. It’s probably the hangover. 

Beca groans. “I think I’m gonna throw up.” 

She lets Chloe drag her to McDonald’s anyway. It takes half a bottle of Gatorade, two orders of hash browns, and three stories about Chloe’s work nemesis, Veronica, to get her feeling human again but hey. Better late than never. 

**

The Bellas breeze through Regionals like it isn’t even a contest. Amy and Cynthia Rose make a point to stand in front of Beca like human shields whenever they’re backstage.

It doesn’t matter, Benji’s the only Treblemaker to come near them, and all he says is good luck. It’s the thought that counts, though.

“Well done, ladies!” Chloe says after. “Glad to see you’re living up to your legacy.”

“I didn’t know you were coming,” Beca says.

“Well I had to make sure you hadn’t run this group into the ground.” She curls her arm around Beca's waist, pinching Beca's hip when she winks. Beca can feel her face flush, a rush of heat spreading to her gut. What the fuck. It's like her brain is still getting over a break-up but her body has moved on. She tries to look normal as she pulls away from Chloe.

“Oh, she tried,” Amy says, wrapping her arm around Beca’s shoulders. “I’m the one who saved it.”

“That’s... accurate,” Beca says, while everyone laughs.

**

“I know you’re still in your depressed hermit phase or whatever --”

“I am not!”

Chloe makes a _Beca, please_ face and it’s times like these that Beca really hates Skype and FaceTime and everything that lets a person see you instead of just talking on the phone like the good old days.

“I’m really not,” Beca says. Enough time has passed that she’s not lying, at least for the most part. Sure, she’s cried a couple times, but it was always when she was like, sitting alone in the radio station at midnight so that barely counts anyway. And the other day she ran into Jesse and they had an entire conversation that was borderline normal. 

“Okay,” Chloe says, “if you’re so done being Depressed Beca then what’s up with the Janis Ian nails?”

Beca blinks. “She wasn’t depressed, she wrote folk music.”

“Not the singer, you weirdo, from _Mean Girls_.” When Beca doesn’t react she says, “Oh my god, he made you watch all those movies and none of them were _Mean Girls_? You really are better off without him.”

Beca feels a familiar pang of sadness mixed with something else she can't identify. She swallows it down, laughs and rolls her eyes. “Okay, I have to go, I have Bellas.”

“Fix your nails!” Chloe yells and Beca flips her off, chipped black nail and all, right before she disconnects.

**

“First place, aca-bitches!” Stacie yells, raising her beer in the air. The cheers are deafening. Unlike last year, the Semi-Finals had been a relative breeze. Chloe comes backstage to congratulate them after and Beca gets that familiar nervous twist in her gut that makes her reconsider all the choices she’d made for their performance.

“That was aca-mazing!” Chloe grins and another cheer goes up. It takes Beca a moment to realize that Aubrey’s there, too.

“It really was,” she says, nodding approvingly. “I just have a few notes.”

Amy groans and then looks panicked. “I mean, yaaaaay.”

Chloe rolls her eyes and pushes her way over to Beca. “You did it! We’re going to New York!” She throws her arms around Beca.

“We?”

Chloe laughs against her neck and Beca shivers. 

“You really think I’m going to miss it?” Chloe asks, her face serious. “I mean, Aubrey’s had a hotel booked for months.” 

“Oh god.”

“I’m kidding. You should see your face!” Chloe laughs and hugs Beca again. “I mean, I’ll definitely be there and maybe Aubrey will come, too, if she can get time off from work but we’ll see. You know?”

“Yeah, definitely,” Beca says, even though doesn’t, really. Her brain feels like it’s working overtime, trying to process Aubrey maybe or maybe-not being in New York, critiquing their every move, and Chloe’s absolute certainty that she’ll be there. It’s overwhelming. This whole night is overwhelming.

“What, no flowers?” Cynthia Rose asks.

Chloe lets go of Beca to hug her. “Oh, you know,” she says, laughing.

Cynthia Rose laughs too. “You and Aubrey coming to the after party?”

“There’s an after party?” Beca raises her eyebrows.

“Of course. We won, why shouldn’t we celebrate?”

Beca doesn’t have an argument.

**

The after party is really just the Bellas, new and old, crammed into Stacie’s apartment with enough alcohol to kill a small hippo. 

“You know what this reminds me of?” Chloe finds Beca in a corner, mixing herself another drink. 

“Spring break, wooo!?” Beca half-yells, arms up over her head. Chloe laughs, loud and hard, and suddenly Beca feels really, _really_ drunk. 

“That first party. After initiation,” Chloe says, listing towards Beca. She catches herself with a hand on Beca’s hip and leaves it there, her fingers curled around the Bellas scarf woven around Beca’s belt.

“Yeah.” Beca’s mouth is dry; she takes a drink. “That was fun.”

Chloe’s face lights up. “It was. It really, really was.”

She grins and because she has this thing that Beca kind of hates where her enthusiasm is infectious, they both end up smiling stupidly at each other. 

“I knew you could do it,” Chloe says. Beca tilts her head but doesn’t say anything. “I’m just --” Chloe leans in close, close enough that their noses bump. The air goes out of Beca’s lungs and then Chloe sways back. “I’m just -- I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks,” Beca says. She doesn’t know when her free hand ended up on Chloe’s elbow, but it did. 

“Hey, no secrets!” Stacie yells right in Beca’s ear. It startles her and she jumps back, away from Chloe, her drink sloshing everywhere. Lily’s behind Stacie, saying God knows what. 

“We weren’t,” Beca says, “Jeez.” Chloe blots at her shirt with a napkin. 

“Speech!” someone starts chanting. Beca shakes her head. 

“No no no.” 

“Aubrey would’ve,” Amy says.

“Well maybe Aubrey should give this one,” Beca mutters. Behind her, she hears Chloe laugh.

“I love you,” Chloe says later, her hand on the top of Beca’s head while Aubrey tries to herd her out the door. 

“Yeah, I love you too,” Beca says, the words slurred with liquor and exhaustion.

She cracks open her eyes in time to see Chloe looking at her, waving, flush high on her cheeks, her eyes unbelievably huge and blue. Even though she’s exhausted, it takes Beca an annoyingly long time to fall asleep.

**

Beca’s not stupid. Chloe’s obviously hot and Beca’s been kind of into her since, well, since the whole shower thing last year. But first there was Bellas and then Jesse and now Chloe’s pretty much her best friend and Beca doesn't want to lose almost two years worth of friendship for some random risk that she'd probably end up freaking out about and ruining anyway. So when she doesn’t hear from Chloe for almost a week after Stacie’s party, a part of her starts to panic.

It’s stupid, probably, because it’s not like anything happened. There really isn’t a need for panic. But she still has to screw up her courage to suck it up and IM Chloe after rehearsals one evening, _16 days without a rehearsal injury!_. She keeps it purposefully light because what is she going to say, _hey, are you mad at me? You’re being weird._ Fuck no. _That_ would be weird. 

There’s a long, drawn-out pause before the screen shows _Chloe is typing_ ; Beca’s heart’s in her throat the entire time.

All her stress turns out to be pointless because Chloe responds and things are fine. Good, even. Chloe immediately starts harassing her about their song choices for the Finals and everything’s normal. Beca has never felt more relieved.

**

“Come on,” Chloe whines. “I’ll make grilled cheese.”

Beca laughs. “Well if you’re going to cook...” 

She’s at Chloe’s place within the hour, feeling stressed out in a way she’s never been around Chloe before. She’s hyper-aware of the way their fingers brush against hers when Chloe hands her a wineglass, of the way Chloe tips her head back when she laughs. Of everything.

The night is atypically weird -- they eat and watch TV and talk about Beca’s plans for the Finals, but it’s just. It’s weird. Probably because Beca’s can’t get out of her own head and act like a normal person. 

“I’m sorry if I’m -- if this -- do you want more wine?” Chloe pours herself a glass and then offers the bottle to Beca.

“No, I have to drive.” 

For a second she thinks Chloe might try to make her spend the night and the panic sets it. She digs her nails into her palm to calm herself down.

But Chloe just offers her water instead. 

“I got it,” Beca says, getting up before Chloe can. 

“Cheers,” Chloe says when Beca sits back down. She scoots closer to Beca on the couch, turned so her knees are bumping Beca’s leg, and clinks her glass against Beca’s.

“Isn’t that bad luck? Toasting with water?”

Chloe pointed takes a drink. “I don’t believe in bad luck.” She smirks. 

“Alright,” Beca says, “but don’t start yelling at me when your car breaks down or a creepy kid comes out of your TV and tries to steal all your jewelry.” 

Chloe cracks up. “Oh my god you fall asleep five minutes into _The Ring_ or something?” 

“It was really boring,” Beca says quietly. Chloe laughs so hard she tips forward, her whole body curling into Beca’s. When she sits up her eyes are shiny like she’d been near tears. Her free hand is curved around Beca’s knee, her fingers tracing the seam of her jeans. Beca clutches her glass and forces herself to breathe normally. She wonder if Chloe can tell that her heart’s pounding.

Chloe shifts, leaning in, and it’s like time slows down. Beca thinks _oh God_ and then _oh_ , everything sliding into place like puzzle pieces: Chloe’s hand on her leg, the tilt of her head, her tongue darting out to wet her lips. Every inch of Beca’s skin is buzzing with anticipation. For a moment, Beca thinks kissing Chloe might not be the worst idea.

But then Chloe’s phone rings and Beca flinches, reality crashing down on her. A blush creeps up Chloe’s cheeks as she apologizes and scrambles to answer it.

“It’s okay. I -- I should go.” 

Chloe frowns. “Aubrey, I’ll call you later,” she says. To Beca she says, “What? Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” Beca smiles, already backing towards the door. “It’s late and -- “ She stops, her hand on the doorknob. “I had a good time. Thanks.”

“Sure, any time.” Chloe smiles back. Beca would have to be blind to know it wasn’t forced. 

**

Beca can’t stop thinking about it after, keeps replaying the whole night in her head: Chloe’s dumb jokes about wine making grilled cheese classy; her laugh, high and clear, after Beca had made fun of her; the way her eyes had flicked to Beca’s mouth right before she leaned in, right before the phone rang. Her face when Beca stood at the door, six different emotions playing across her face until she’d smiled. 

She’d let Beca go so easily. Beca kind of wishes she hadn’t. It's just -- she does this shit to herself all the time, cuts and runs before things even get a chance to _be_ something. She’s getting sick of it.

It's a shitty realization, as far as timing goes.

“Are you okay?” Cynthia Rose asks halfway through rehearsal. 

“I’m fine.”

Cynthia Rose looks at her like she’s lost her mind. “Okay well you just spun in the complete opposite direction.”

The rest of the Bellas are watching her just as skeptically. “Blow me,” Beca says, ignoring the way Cynthia Rose rolls her eyes as she walks back to position. “From the top, let’s go.”

**

She lingers after practice, waits until everyone’s gone so nobody’s there to catcall or make obscene gestures while she calls Chloe. 

“Hey, it’s me.” She talks fast. She doesn’t want to give herself time to chicken out. “Stacie’s throwing a party next week. You should come.”

Chloe doesn’t hesitate. “Okay.“

“Cool.” Even though no one can see her, Beca bites the inside of her cheek to keep herself from grinning like an idiot.

**

Stacie’s apartment is dark and loud and _hot_ when Beca walks in. 

“There you are!” Chloe grabs her by the coat lapels. “Amy said she saw you by the bathroom.”

“I just got here,” Beca yells over the music. Chloe rolls her eyes and tugs on her coat like _obviously_. “I didn’t know it was going to be this big!”

“It’s good!” Chloe yells. “Come on!” She pulls Beca with her. Amy’s standing at the keg.

“You found her!” She high fives Chloe.

“I just got here,” Beca says. Amy shrugs.

“Then it must’ve been your doppelganger.” She hands Chloe and Beca cups and shoos them out of the way so the people behind them can get drinks.

“I need to get this off.” Beca tugs at her coat. She’s already sweating. 

“Stacie’s room!” Amy yells. Beca nods. Maybe she’ll pass a window she can crack open. 

It’s quieter in there. Cooler, too. Beca drops her coat over the desk chair and lets out a sigh. She's too keyed up, full of anticipation and uncertainty. She takes another breath and wills herself to calm down.

When she comes back out, Chloe’s leaning against the opposite wall, waiting. It's instantaneous, the way Beca's insides start buzzing again, all those breathing exercises she just did shot to hell.

Chloe holds out her cup and waits for Beca to do the same. 

“Cheers.” She takes a drink. Beca goes hot all over again. “C’mon,” Chloe says, grabbing her free hand and pulling her towards the music. Beca takes a drink and goes.

**

She originally came in here because she left her phone in her coat pocket. She only stayed because it was cool and quiet.

“Hey.”

Beca jumps. “Jesus, you are terrifying, you know that?”

Chloe laughs. “You’re pretty terrifying, too.”

Beca scoffs. 

“What, you think you’re not? Because I have news for you, Beca Mitchell.” She touches her finger to the tip of Beca’s nose. “You are.”

Part of Beca wants to be insulted but up this close Chloe’s smile is even more distracting. “Well.” she says, her voice weirdly shaky. “Good.”

Even though she's anticipating it, the space between them almost charged with electricity like the air before a storm, there's still a moment when Chloe leans in and Beca's instinct is to duck her head, or turn, or say something spectacularly ridiculous about the number of coats on Stacie's bed right now. But she doesn't, and then Chloe's kissing her, her lips soft and slick with lip gloss. Her tongue swipes across Beca’s bottom lip and Beca can't remember why she almost panicked in the first place. She makes a noise in the back of her throat and opens her mouth under Chloe’s, slides her hand in Chloe’s hair and tugs, using that to change the angle. Just like that, everything is fucking amazing.

Somehow Chloe gets her backed up against the wall and all coherent thoughts go out of Beca’s head as things go from cautious to frantic. Her hand finds its way under the back of Chloe’s shirt and she strokes her thumb across the smooth skin there; Chloe shivers with her whole body.

When they break apart Beca’s tips her head back against the wall and closes her eyes. She can feel Chloe breathing, her rib cage moving against Beca’s. Chloe presses a light kiss to the curve of Beca's jaw, follows it up with a scrape of her teeth. Beca's breath hitches.

“So,” Chloe says, pulling back when Beca opens her eyes. In the dim light she can see that Chloe’s lip gloss is a smeary mess. “What songs are you doing for the Finals?”

It’s not at all what Beca was expecting, which is why she laughs. She’s still laughing when Chloe kisses her again.

“No, seriously,” she says Beca’s cheeks in her hands, their bodies pressed close, legs fitted together. Beca shifts her hips and takes delight in the way Chloe’s eyes flutter closed when she gasps. She wants to find a way to do that forever.

“As soon as I know, you will,” Beca promises. It’s a miracle her voice is as steady as it is.

“Deal,” Chloe says, and seals it with a kiss.


End file.
